MatchupCamp organizer Ed Costello notes, “MatchupCamp — matchmaking for startups – is all about startup
networking, creating a place for ideas and talent to meet. MatchupCamp has the sole objective of bringing together people looking to start, expand, or join a startup in New York (and the tri-state area).  If you want to get your hands dirty and build something new, this is the place.”

If you are looking for a job with a startup in NYC, you better be at this event. And if you are planning to look for help for your startup, be ready to clearly explain what your startup does and why someone should want to join the team. Just like finding that special someone at a speed dating event, both sides need to see interest.

MatchUp Camp II will be held at the For Your Imagination studios on December 8th. You can register here – Ed notes that he is looking for a few sponsors to help with some minor expenses.

From a customer perspective, the new machines are faster and use less paper than the old clunkers.

The old lottery machines used a landline to connect to the main center to transmit the lottery ticket information. It appears the new machines use a Sprint wireless card for data transmission. The top retailer in the state was delayed in receiving the new machines because they couldn’t get a signal underground. I was told that they were working on a new solution last weekend but haven’t been back as of yet to see if they found a solution. In my discussions with lottery retailers, all noted that at least once they had issues with the wireless access. Today one top 20 retailer was unable to redeem instant tickets due to an issue with their signal. Overall the retailers I spoke with are happy with the new lottery machines.

The title of this post comes from something I heard when I was at a newsstand last week. The new lottery machines play a very loud jingle and buzzer sound when the lottery retailer scans a winning ticket. It doesn’t matter if the customer won $1 or $1,000,000, the sound is exactly the same. If I remember, machines in South Carolina also play a jingle when a winning ticket is redeemed.

The people in line waiting to play their lottery tickets got into a discussion about the jingle and whether it was necessary. One man shouted, “this lottery machine gonna get someone killed”. The discussion centered around the idea that criminals could easily just wait for the jingle and know that a person is now walking out with more cash than they entered with.

The idea of a jingle to let someone know that they won is not needed and should be removed. There is a customer screen on the new lottery machines which displays the winning dollar amount. Sometimes a cute use of technology could lead to trouble down the road.

The concept is pretty simple…a startup blog exchange. Nearly every startup I visit either for CN coverage, requests for assistance or URL verification at my startup has a blog. Startup Ticker is a great place to find all of the blog posts in one place. We run the ST ticker on the right menu of CN.

Instead of an aggregator, what I am proposing is a blog exchange where each startup blog includes a post from another startup on their blog. To make it simple, let’s assume there were three blogs in the exchange – they might exchange a post once a month in the following fashion:

• Blog A guest posts on Blog C
• Blog B guest posts on Blog A
• Blog C guest posts on Blog B

For this concept to work, we would need enough blogs in the exchange network to make sure that there is a good variety. I guess we would need some sort of categorization system as well. My initial thought is that the guest posts must be non-promotional but they should include a note about the author and his or her startup.

The goal would be to provide startups with a new layer of visibility to a new set of users and potential customers. Most startups want more visibility but it seems these days only a small batch of startups receive the majority of the press attention. This startup blog exchange would give all of us a chance to reach further outside our communities. What would it take to make this exchange successful? One new user? One new customer? The nice thing is that it might not even take any real work as the content would most likely already be posted on the startup’s blog - it would just be syndicated to another blog in the exchange.

Let’s ignore the back-end technical piece for now. Please leave your honest thoughts about this concept in the comments. I purposely tried to keep this post simple so we can iterate (potentially) towards a stronger final concept.

Here are a few of the events throughout the week:

• Wine 2.0 Expo – Nov. 18 – $45-125 – Webster Hall
• NY Entrepreneur Week - variety of events around Manhattan throughout the week – price varies based on startup stage or investor level
• Web 2.0 Expo – all week – Javits Center – prices vary depending on level of access from $845-1995 – Expo Pass is free
• Future of Web Design – Nov 17 – New World Stages – $395
• Drinks4Startups – November 18 – Free
• Interop – all week – Javits Center – prices vary depending on level of access from $845-2995 – Expo Pass is free
• Diggnation – watch the Diggnation show live – Nov 17 – free
• Brandhackers “Google AdPlanner for Social Media Presentation” - November 16 – free
• Social Media Mixologists Holiday Kickoff Mixer - Nov 17 – free
• WordCamp NYC – Baruch College, CUNY - Nov 13 – free

Send me any events you would like to add to the above list. I expect all of you to get out there – at a minimum take all the free expo passes and mingle. If you would like to meet – drop me a line. We can chat about your startup, my startup, the industry, the subway, etc.

Please note that CN is listed as a media sponsor of some of the events throughout the week.

The new subway map lines also work on the mobile version of Google Maps. Google notes that they provide transit directions for 436 transit agencies around the world.

While the subway lines on the map are nice, nothing beats the Swiss Rail mashup that shows the trains in real-time and they actually move on the map!

Judging from the length of the line, as shown in the video below, the online advertising industry must be out of the recession and ready for major growth. Either that or there was no plan for how to handle that most conference attendees would want to, you know, actually enter the conference. Now that I think about it and listening to people on the line, it is definitely the latter. There are actually two lines like the one in the video below. As of Noon today, the line appeared to be at least 75 minutes long. Lots of people seemed pissed that they paid anywhere from $35-$1,800 and had to wait for their badge. I assume by this afternoon they will have this registration issue resolved. Let’s hope that the Web 2.0 check-in process will be smoother later this month.

If you decide to watch the video, please note that there is a lot of camera shake.

The bus locator service is available via the addition of GPS transmission devices placed on their buses. Currently you need to call NY Waterway to find out when the next bus will arrive although the company says that mobile apps are coming soon. Not sure why you would launch without a way to get the information automatically via your computer or mobile device.

Earlier this year the NYC MTA launched a test of a bus locator service on several crosstown bus routes. Many other cities already have displays with a list of times until the next bus arrives. While I am not a fan of this functionality underground (there is never a long wait), I am a big fan of this technology for the bus fleet. The countdown timers can give you a quick indication if you should walk or take a cab.

ZocDoc is very easy to use. You select your insurance provider, location and specialty (dentist, psychiatrist, derm, etc.) and ZocDoc spits back a list of available appointment times. For me it’s saved a ton of time calling around to find available appointments that match both my insurance provider and my availability. ZocDoc notes that they have over 21,000 listed appointments in the D.C. area. In NYC ZocDoc has over 300,000 available appointments and the company notes that over 90,000 people use the service each month.

It’s great to see a NY-based startup expanding to another east-coast city.

Check out all of our ZocDoc coverage including my real-world test of the service. ZocDoc team members are also looking to meet with Senator Olympia Snowe around health-care reform, something I’ve written about previously and still believe we are doing it all wrong.

Unigo CEO Jordan Golman told me earlier today, “Unigo’s network of students across America have been working with the Journal to create an inside look at the world of college admissions and college life.” Unigo covers 2,000+ colleges and universities from across the U.S. Content for the new WSJ on Campus site will come from current Unigo content and new exclusive content from the WSJ.

The WSJ publishes a Classroom Edition from September through May and today’s announcement will be a complement to the newspaper.

Unigo is a NY-based startup that is one to watch. Check out my video interview with Jordan from earlier this year. Jordan also provided a column offering tips on how to get your startup on television.

Nearly every station I’ve been to recently had very clear announcements on the platforms. This is a big change from the announcement systems of the 70s and 80s. There are announcements about security, how long until the next train arrives and a variety of other public service messages.

With all of the talk these days about local and local advertising, this could be a great opportunity for the MTA to launch “platform audio advertising”. I could see two types of ads; a general category that runs across the system and a local category with ads for companies that are within a short distance of the current station.

Now let’s come back to the countdown timers. We know how far a train is from a station and that distance tells us the precise time to play the ads. Naturally we wouldn’t want to play an ad when a train is entering the station. There is plenty of time between trains entering and departing to provide a reasonable amount of ads that don’t overwhelm riders while still providing value to the local community.

A self-service system similar to Google AdWords would work well for this transit audio advertising network. Pick your time, your station(s), etc and place your bid. Other factors would have to be taken into account as well to make sure a variety of businesses were able to get in on the action.

You already have to listen to other people’s music on the subway so why not listen to some brief ads that keep our fares low and might actually provide real local value.

In related transit news, FourSquare and BART announced a partnership today.

As a railfan, it’s so exciting to see the major transit systems across the U.S. starting to embrace technology.

TechAviv Angels Launch

TechAviv founder Yaron Samid has announced the launch of a new angel investing group named TechAviv Angels. Several popular NYC startup founders are part of the group including Ron Yekutiel from Kaltura and Yaron Galai from Outbrain. It looks like about 15 entrepreneurs make up the TechAviv Angels group. In addition, a number of early stage VC firms are participating as well.

From the announcement, “We seek to identify, fund and mentor our next generation of big winners. Every two months in Tel Aviv 5 startups get 5 minutes to pitch in front of our members. We’re an informal Angel club with members investing individually.”

It’s free to present and the first demo night will be held on November 24. I am unsure of is if the demo event will be held in NYC or in Israel. I will update this post once I find out the answer. More details on Ouriel Ohayon’s blog.

RRE Offers Office Hours

NYC VC firm RRE Ventures has announced that they will now offer office hours beginning on November 9. Each entrepreneur can signup for a 15-minute slot and discuss any topic with the venture capital team at RRE. RRE has invested in a number of NYC-based startups including Adaptive Blue, Drop.io and GoMobo.

There’s a new service that will help you reveal your interests in a man or a woman named SubwayCrush. The service currently serves NYC, London, San Francisco, Boston and Chicago. The idea is simple…find someone on the train you are interested in, write up the person’s specs on SubwayCrush and then the person might just answer. Naturally the more people who know about, and use, SubwayCrush, the better chance you have for a match.

You can view all “crushes” by city or by type (e.g m4w, m4m, w4m, w4w). You must enter the rail line you were on when you found your crush — this helps narrow down who it might be. I hear stories all the time about people finding love on the subway. I did a search for “hot male entrepreneur who also runs a tech blog” on a few of the subway lines in NYC but I came up empty.

I am guessing at some point they will add the ability to post photos – which might be a bit creepy. They should also add the ability to signup for alerts based on location and/or subway line.

The service was created by NY-based Lolz.

To start off with, I must thank all who spoke with me and gave me a short 30 second pitch – and will list them below. I also asked two questions, based on the recent discussion on tech companies and product managers in NYC brought up by Fred Wilson at the Clickable Cafe from a couple of weeks ago.

It was asserted that there is a dearth of “product managers” in New York City and a growth of this community (and skill set) would be a positive indicator of NY Tech growth. So, aside from meeting the founders – I asked about their tech staff and their “product management” staff.

Requisite Company Mentions
As promised, I wanted to mention the companies I met last night. All were excellent discussions – albeit incredibly fast…

• Market Publique – online market place for vintage clothing (must be at least 20 years old)
• MyItThings – online user-generated fashion magazine
• Mobile Commons – SMS/telephone advocacy tools
• UpSkil.com – a new career education site (cheaper but better than UoP)
• foursquare – mobile, location-based notification and community tool
• centrl – mobile, location- and social-network-based community tool
• boomerater – user-generated portal/magazine for baby-boomers into a number of vericals
• Funnel Scope – travel search engine with twitter API connection to converse with friends on trip decisions
• Asian in NY – a “craigslist for Asian community members” or a gumtree in the US for the Asian community
• Kidmondo – online baby journals
• cookstr – online receipes
• MeetingWave – faciliatating connecting in person with your contacts (Meetup meets LinkedIn)
• Convos – one-stop group communication and management platform
• OMGPOP – online multi-player games for teens
• Unigo – online publisher using student-generated content on universities
• Gate Guru – iPhone app for information on airports (similar to SeatGuru for airplanes)
• SquareSpace – SaaS web CMS with extensive tools
• kgb_web – an upcoming “Pandora for Content” – recommendation engine for all forms of content (with many other incarnations)
• Instinctiv – a smart-phone music player with stronger recommendation tools by tracking your on-device actions (e.g. skip, fast-forward, etc)
• Stratus Security – API access management and billing toolset

Now, in the course of the discussions with these companies – there were a couple of observations I made:

• Over 80% of these companies would not be considered “tech companies” – specifically a company that is a tech product that is solving a business need. Rather, most of these companies were media or service companies that were startups – using tech as one of their differentiator. Most of these companies either outsourced or “had a tech guy” on their founding team.
• Of the other 20% of the companies, the product management work was being handled by the founder, the CEO (and or CTO) or (in the rare case of kgbweb) a separate Sr VP of Products.
• “Product management” was understood as “owning the product”, but the strengths of the owner was the driving factor of what the responsibilities were of the PM.
• One person who discussed with me about his company also mentioned that as a former Product Manager of a major bank, he could not find “product management” jobs in NYC when he went looking.

Why the concern?
One of the comments Fred made at the Clickable event was the need for more product managers in NYC to help create startups. Being a former Valley guy (Silicon Valley, not SoCal!), I was a product manager for a number of companies and knew the community of members during my time there. PMs were the “CEOs” of their products – either by market or by channel. Their responsibility was to the P&L of their product line and responsible for:

• sales performance (how the sales team performed with direct authority over them),
• market penetration (what percentage of the market did they own)
• marketing message and communication (how did the market understand the product)
• product features and enhancements (to expand their market offering)
• product delivery and testing (working with engineering/production to deliver the product on time)
• customer acceptance and service (all about retention and up-to-the-minute status on product service)

Depending on the company, these responsibilities had different priorities based on internal resources. But, if you note the list above, these are also the responsibilities of a small business owner – just at a very different scale or vocabulary.

During Web 1.0 in the Valley, the strongest CEOs tended to be the PMs of other companies because they could easily generate the direction for these areas – not simply one person for each. By being strong in a number of these areas and being able to tie them together into a coherent product and company strategy is one of the keys to a successful company. The challenge: how do you make companies that need such product managers that are also (eventually) rewarded for being the CEOs of small startups in the future?

Editor’s note: I represented my startup last evening and Sanford listed it above – I removed the link and mention as I prefer to keep both separate.

Sanford Dickert (@sanford) is with Contagious Conversations, a technology and marketing  consulting firm offering general contracting services for the digital age.  Sanford is part of the New York Tech community, working to strengthen the New York Tech ecosystem though his work in coworking (cooperBricolage and New Work City), coalition building (COSP), employment opportunities (Cultivate New York) and other development efforts.  In other roles, Sanford has been an Adjunct Professor at Cooper Union and Polytechnic, teaching on Web 2.0 concepts and product development, as well as the Chief Technology Officer for the John Kerry for President Campaign.  In his “spare time”, he also publishes his thoughts on social media, political technology and online engagement in a number of publications.